Lord of the Flies
By William Golding
| Day 7 Audio |
Simon stayed where he was,
a small brown image, concealed by the leaves. Even if he shut his eyes the sow’s
head still remained like an after-image. The half-shut eyes were dim with the
infinite cynicism of adult life. They assured Simon that everything was a bad
business.
“I know that.”
Simon
discovered that he had spoken aloud. He opened his eyes quickly and there was
the head grinning amusedly in the strange daylight, ignoring the flies, the
spilled guts, even ignoring the indignity of being spiked on a stick.
He looked
away, licking his dry lips.
A gift for the
beast. Might not the beast come for it? The head, he thought, appeared to agree
with him. Run away, said the head silently, go back to the others. It was a joke
really-why should you bother? You were just wrong, that’s all. A little
headache, something you ate, perhaps. Go back, child, said the head silently.
Simon looked
up, feeling the weight of his wet hair, and gazed at the sky. Up there, for
once, were clouds, great bulging towers that sprouted away over the island, grey
and cream and copper-colored. The clouds were sitting on the land; they
squeezed, produced moment by moment this close, tormenting heat. Even the
butterflies deserted the open space where the obscene thing grinned and dripped.
Simon lowered his head, carefully keeping his eyes shut, then sheltered them
with his hand. There were no shadows under the trees but everywhere a pearly
stillness, so that what was real seemed illusive and without definition. The
pile of guts was a black blob of flies that buzzed like a saw. After a while
these flies found Simon. Gorged, they alighted by his runnels of sweat and
drank. They tickled under his nostrils and played leap-frog on his thighs. They
were black and iridescent green and without number; and in front of Simon, the
Lord of the Flies hung on his stick and grinned. At last Simon gave up and
looked back; saw the white teeth and dim eyes, the blood-and his gaze was held
by that ancient, inescapable recognition. In Simon’s right temple, a pulse began
to beat on the brain.
Ralph and
Piggy lay in the sand, gazing at the fire and idly flicking pebbles into its
smokeless heart.
“That branch
is gone.”
“Where’s
Samneric?”
“We ought to
get some more wood. We’re out of green branches.”
Ralph sighed
and stood up. There were no shadows under the palms on the platform; only this
strange light that seemed to come from everywhere at once. High up among the
bulging clouds thunder went off like a gun.
“We’re going
to get buckets of rain.”
“What about
the fire?”
Ralph trotted
into the forest and returned with a wide spray of green which he dumped on the
fire. The branch crackled, the leaves curled and the yellow smoke expanded.
Piggy made an
aimless little pattern in the sand with his fingers.
“Trouble is,
we haven’t got enough people for a fire. You got to treat Samneric as one turn.
They do everything together-”
“Of course.”
“Well, that
isn’t fair. Don’t you see? They ought to do two turns.”
Ralph
considered this and understood. He was vexed to find how little he thought like
a grownup and sighed again. The island was getting worse and worse.
Piggy looked
at the fire.
“You’ll want
another green branch soon.”
Ralph rolled
over.
“Piggy. What
are we going to do?”
“Just have to
get on without ‘em.”
“But-the
fire.”
He frowned at
the black and white mess in which lay the unburnt ends of branches. He tried to
formulate.
“I’m scared.”
He saw Piggy
look up; and blundered on.
“Not of the
beast. I mean I’m scared of that too. But nobody else understands about the
fire. If someone threw you a rope when you were drowning. If a doctor said take
this because if you don’t take it you’ll die-you would, wouldn’t you? I mean?”
“ ‘Course I
would.”
“Can’t they
see? Can’t they understand? Without the smoke signal we’ll die here? Look at
that!”
A wave of
heated air trembled above the ashes but without a trace of smoke.
“We can’t keep
one fire going. And they don’t care. And what’s more-” He looked intensely into
Piggy’s streaming face.
“What’s more,
I don’t sometimes. Supposing I got like the others-not caring. What ‘ud
become of us?”
Piggy took off
his glasses, deeply troubled.
“I dunno,
Ralph. We just got to go on, that’s all. That’s what grownups would do.”
Ralph, having
begun the business of unburdening himself, continued.
“Piggy, what’s
wrong?”
Piggy looked
at him in astonishment.
“Do you mean
the-?”
“No, not it
... I mean . . . what makes things break up like they do?”
Piggy rubbed
his glasses slowly and thought. When he understood how far Ralph had gone toward
accepting him he flushed pinkly with pride.
“I dunno,
Ralph. I expect it’s him.”
“Jack?”
“Jack.” A
taboo was evolving round that word too.
Ralph nodded
solemnly.
“Yes,” he
said, “I suppose it must be.”
The forest
near them burst into uproar. Demoniac figures with faces of white and red and
green rushed out howling, so that the littluns fled screaming. Out of the corner
of his eye, Ralph saw Piggy running. Two figures rushed at the fire and he
prepared to defend himself but they grabbed half-burnt branches and raced away
along the beach. The three others stood still, watching Ralph; and he saw that
the tallest of them, stark naked save for paint and a belt, was Jack.
Ralph had his
breath back and spoke.
“Well?”
Jack ignored
him, lifted his spear and began to shout.
“Listen all of
you. Me and my hunters, we’re living along the beach by a flat rock. We hunt and
feast and have fun. If you want to join my tribe come and see us. Perhaps I’ll
let you join. Perhaps not.”
He paused and
looked round. He was safe from shame or self-consciousness behind the mask of
his paint and could look at each of them in turn. Ralph was kneeling by the
remains of the fire like a sprinter at his mark and his face was half-hidden by
hair and smut. Samneric peered together round a palm tree at the edge of the
forest A littlun howled, creased and crimson, by the bathing pool and Piggy
stood on the platform, the white conch gripped in his hands.
‘“Tonight
we’re having a feast We’ve killed a pig and we’ve got meat. You can come and eat
with us if you like.”
Up in the
cloud canyons the thunder boomed again. Jack and the two anonymous savages with
him swayed, looking up, and then recovered. The littlun went on howling. Jack
was waiting for something. He whispered urgently to the others.
“Go on-now!”
The two
savages murmured. Jack spoke sharply.
“Go on!” The
two savages looked at each other, raised their spears together and spoke in
time.
“The Chief has
spoken.”
Then the three
of them turned and trotted away.
Presently
Ralph rose to his feet, looking at the place where the savages had vanished.
Samneric came, talking in an awed whisper.
“I thought it
was-”
“-and I was-”
“-scared.”
Piggy stood
above them on the platform, still holding the conch.
“That was Jack
and Maurice and Robert,” said Ralph. “Aren’t they having fun?”
“I thought I
was going to have asthma.”
“Sucks to your
butt-mar.”
“When I saw
Jack I was sure he’d go for the conch. Can’t think why.”
The group of
boys looked at the white shell with affectionate respect. Piggy placed it in
Ralph’s hands and the littluns, seeing the familiar symbol, started to come
back.
“Not here.”
He turned
toward the platform, feeling the need for ritual. First went Ralph, the white
conch cradled, then Piggy very grave, then the twins, then the littluns and the
others.
“Sit down all
of you. They raided us for fire. They’re having fun. But the-”
Ralph was
puzzled by the shutter that flickered in his brain. There was something he
wanted to say; then the shutter had come down.
“But the-”
They were
regarding him gravely, not yet troubled by any doubts about his sufficiency.
Ralph pushed the idiot hair out of his eyes and looked at Piggy.
“But the ...
oh ... the fire! Of course, the fire!”
He started to
laugh, then stopped and became fluent instead.
“The fire’s
the most important thing. Without the fire we can’t be rescued. I’d like to put
on war-paint and be a savage. But we must keep the fire burning. The fire’s the
most important thing on the island, because, because-”
He paused
again and the silence became full of doubt and wonder.
Piggy
whispered urgently. “Rescue.”
“Oh yes.
Without the fire we can’t be rescued. So we must stay by the fire and make
smoke.”
When he
stopped no one said anything. After the many brilliant speeches that had been
made on this very spot Ralph s remarks seemed lame, even to the littluns. At
last Bill held out his hands for the conch. “Now we can’t have the fire up
there-because we can’t have the fire up there-we need more people to keep it
going. Let’s go to this feast and tell them the fire’s hard on the rest of us.
And the hunting and all that, being savages I mean-it must be jolly good fun.”
Samneric took
the conch.
“That must be
fun like Bill says-and as he’s invited us-”
“-to a feast-”
“-meat-”
“-crackling-”
“-I could do
with some meat-”
Ralph held up
his hand.
“Why shouldn’t
we get our own meat?”
The twins
looked at each other. Bill answered.
“We don’t want
to go in the jungle.”
Ralph
grimaced.
“He-you
know-goes.”
“He’s a
hunter. They’re all hunters. That’s different.”
No one spoke
for a moment, then Piggy muttered to the sand.
“Meat-”
The littluns
sat, solemnly thinking of meat, and dribbling. Overhead the cannon boomed again
and the dry palm fronds clattered in a sudden gust of hot wind.
“You are a
silly little boy,” said the Lord of the Flies, “just an ignorant, silly little
boy.”
Simon moved
his swollen tongue but said nothing.
“Don’t you
agree?” said the Lord of the Flies. “Aren’t you just a silly little boy?”
Simon answered
him in the same silent voice.
“Well then,”
said the Lord of the Flies, “you’d better run off and play with the others. They
think you’re batty. You don’t want Ralph to think you’re batty, do you? You like
Ralph a lot, don’t you? And Piggy, and Jack?”
Simon’s head
was tilted slightly up. His eyes could not break away and the Lord of the Flies
hung in space before him.
“What are you
doing out here all alone? Aren’t you afraid of me?”
Simon shook.
“There isn’t
anyone to help you. Only me. And I’m the Beast.”
Simon’s mouth
labored, brought forth audible words.
“Pig’s head on
a stick.”
“Fancy
thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill!” said the head. For a
moment or two the forest and all the other dimly appreciated places echoed with
the parody of laughter. “You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you? Close, close,
close! I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are what they are?”
The laughter
shivered again.
“Come now,”
said the Lord of the Flies. “Get back to the others and we’ll forget the whole
thing.”
Simon’s head
wobbled. His eyes were half closed as though he were imitating the obscene thing
on the stick. He knew that one of his times was coming on. The Lord of the Flies
was expanding like a balloon.
“This is
ridiculous. You know perfectly well you’ll only meet me down there-so don’t try
to escape!”
Simon’s body
was arched and stiff. The Lord of the Flies spoke in the voice of a
schoolmaster.
“This has gone
quite far enough. My poor, misguided child, do you think you know better than I
do?”
There was a
pause.
“I’m warning
you. I’m going to get angry. D’you see? You’re not wanted. Understand? We are
going to have fun on this island. Understand? We are going to have fun on this
island! So don’t try it on, my poor misguided boy, or else-”
Simon found he
was looking into a vast mouth. There was blackness within, a blackness that
spread.
“-Or else,”
said the Lord of the Flies, “we shall do you. See? Jack and Roger and Maurice
and Robert and Bill and Piggy and Ralph. Do you. See?”
Simon was
inside the mouth. He fell down and lost consciousness.
A View to a Death
Over the
island the build-up of clouds continued. A steady current of heated air rose all
day from the mountain and was thrust to ten thousand feet; revolving masses of
gas piled up the static until the air was ready to explode. By early evening the
sun had gone and a brassy glare had taken the place of clear daylight. Even the
air that pushed in from the sea was hot ana held no refreshment. Colors drained
from water and trees and pink surfaces of rock, and the white and brown clouds
brooded, Nothing prospered but the flies who blackened their lord and made the
spilt guts look like a heap of glistening coal Even when the vessel broke in
Simon’s nose and the blood gushed out they left him alone, preferring the pig’s
high flavor.
With the
running of the blood Simon’s fit passed into the weariness of sleep. He lay in
the mat of creepers while the evening advanced and the cannon continued to play.
At last he woke and saw dimly the dark earth close by his cheek. Still he did
not move but lay there, his face side-ways on the earth, his eyes looking dully
before him. Then he turned over, drew his feet under him and laid hold of the
creepers to pull himself up. When the creepers shook the flies exploded from the
guts with a vicious note and clamped back on again. Simon got to his feet. The
light was unearthly. The Lord of the Flies hung on his stick like a black ball.
Simon spoke
aloud to the clearing.
“What else is
there to do?”
Nothing
replied. Simon turned away from the open space and crawled through the creepers
till he was in the dusk of the forest. He walked drearily between the trunks,
his face empty of expression, and the blood was dry round his mouth and chin.
Only sometimes as he lifted the ropes of creeper aside and chose his direction
from the trend of the land, he mouthed words that did not reach the air.
Presently the
creepers festooned the trees less frequently and there was a scatter of pearly
light from the sky down through the trees. This was the backbone of the island,
the slightly higher land that lay beneath the mountain where the forest was no
longer deep Jungle. Here there were wide spaces interspersed with thickets and
huge trees and the trend of the ground led him up as the forest opened. He
pushed on, staggering sometimes with his weariness but never stopping. The usual
brightness was gone from his eyes and he walked with a sort of glum
determination like an old man.
A buffet of
wind made him stagger and he saw that he was out in the open, on rock, under a
brassy sky. He found his legs were weak and his tongue gave him pain all the
time. When the wind reached the mountain-top he could see something happen, a
flicker of blue stuff against brown clouds. He pushed himself forward and the
wind came again, stronger now, cuffing the forest heads till they ducked and
roared. Simon saw a humped thing suddenly sit up on the top and look down at
him. He hid his face, and toiled on.
The flies had
found the figure too. The life-like movement would scare them off for a moment
so that they made a dark cloud round the head. Then as the blue material of the
parachute collapsed the corpulent figure would bow forward, sighing, and the
flies settle once more.
Simon felt his
knees smack the rock. He crawled forward and soon he understood. The tangle of
lines showed him the mechanics of this parody; he examined the white nasal
bones, the teeth, the colors of corruption. He saw how pitilessly the layers of
rubber and canvas held together the poor body that should be rotting away. Then
the wind blew again and the figure lifted, bowed, and breathed foully at him.
Simon knelt on all fours and was sick till his stomach was empty. Then he took
the lines in his hands; he freed them from the rocks and the figure from the
wind’s indignity.
At last he
turned away and looked down at the beaches. The fire by the platform appeared to
be out, or at least making no smoke. Further along the beach, beyond the little
river and near a great slab of rock, a thin trickle of smoke was climbing into
the sky. Simon, forgetful of the lies, shaded his eyes with both hands and
peered at the smoke. Even at that distance it was possible to see most of the
boys-perhaps all the boys-were there. So they had shifted camp then, away from
the beast. As Simon thought this, he turned to the poor broken thing that sat
stinking by his side. The beast was harmless and horrible; and the news must
reach the others as soon as possible. He started down the mountain and his legs
gave beneath him. Even with great care the best he could do was a stagger.
“Bathing,”
said Ralph, “that’s the only thing to do.”
Piggy was
inspecting the looming sky through his glass.
“I don’t like
them clouds. Remember how it rained just after we landed?”
“Going to rain
again.”
Ralph dived
into the pool. A couple of littluns were playing at the edge, trying to extract
comfort from a wetness warmer than blood. Piggy took off his glasses, stepped
primly into the water and then put them on again. Ralph came to the surface and
squirted a jet of water at him.
“Mind my
specs,” said Piggy. “If I get water on the glass I got to get out and clean
‘em.”
Ralph squirted
again and missed. He laughed at Piggys expecting him to retire meekly as usual
and in pained silence. Instead, Piggy beat the water with his hands.
“Stop it!” he
shouted. “D`you hear?”
Furiously he
drove the water into Ralph’s face.
“All right,
all right,” said Ralph. “Keep your hair on.”
Piggy stopped
beating the water.
“I got a pain
in my head. I wish the air was cooler.”
“I wish the
rain would come.”
“I wish we
could go home.”
Piggy lay back
against the sloping sand side of the pool. His stomach protruded and the water
dried on it Ralph squirted up at the sky. One could guess at the movement of the
sun by the progress of a light patch among the clouds. He knelt in the water and
looked round.
“Where’s
everybody?”
Piggy sat up.
“P`raps
they’re lying in the shelter.”
“Where’s
Samneric?”
“And Bill?”
Piggy pointed
beyond the platform.
“That’s where
they’ve gone. Jack’s parry.”
“Let them go,”
said Ralph, uneasily, “I don’t care.”
“Just for some
meat-”
“And for
hunting,” said Ralph, wisely, “and for pretending to be a tribe, and putting on
war-paint.”
Piggy stirred
the sand under water and did not look at Ralph.
“P’raps we
ought to go too.” Ralph looked at him quickly and Piggy blushed, “I mean-to make
sure nothing happens.” Ralph squirted water again.
Long before
Ralph and Piggy came up with Jack’s lot, they could hear the party. There was a
stretch of grass in a place where the palms left a wide band of turf between the
forest and the snore. Just one step down from the edge of the turf was the
white, blown sand of above high water, warm, dry, trodden. Below that again was
a rock that stretched away toward the lagoon. Beyond was a short stretch of sand
and then the edge of the water. A fire burned on the rock and fat dripped from
the roasting pig-meat into the invisible flames. All the boys of the island,
except Piggy, Ralph, Simon, and the two tending the pig, were grouped on the
turf. They were laughing, singing, lying, squatting, or standing on the grass,
holding food in their hands. But to judge by the greasy faces, the meat eating
was almost done; and some held coconut shells in their hands and were drinking
from them. Before the party had started a great log had been dragged into the
center of the lawn and Jack, painted and garlanded, sat there like an idol.
There were piles of meat on green leaves near him, and fruit, and coconut shells
full of drink.
Piggy and
Ralph came to the edge of the grassy platform; and the boys, as they noticed
them, fell silent one by one till only the boy next to Jack was talking. Then
the silence intruded even there and Jack turned where he sat For a time he
looked at them and the crackle of the fire was the loudest noise over the
droning of the reef, Ralph looked away; and Sam, thinking that Ralph had turned
to him accusingly, put down his gnawed bone with a nervous giggle. Ralph took an
uncertain step, pointed to a palm tree, and whispered something inaudible to
Piggy; and they both giggled like Sam. Lifting his feet high out of the sand,
Ralph started to stroll past. Piggy tried to whistle.
At this moment
the boys who were cooking at the fire suddenly hauled off a great chunk of meat
and ran with it toward the grass. They bumped Piggy, who was burnt, and yelled
and danced. Immediately, Ralph and the crowd of boys were united and relieved by
a storm of laughter. Piggy once more was the center of social derision so that
everyone felt cheerful and normal.
Jack stood up
and waved his spear.
“Take them
some meat.”
The boys with
the spit gave Ralph and Piggy each a succulent chunk. They took the gift,
dribbling. So they stood and ate beneath a sky of thunderous brass that rang
with the storm-coming.
Jack waved his
spear again.
“Has everybody
eaten as much as they want?”
There was
still food left, sizzling on the wooden spits, heaped on the green platters.
Betrayed by his stomach, Piggy threw a picked bone down on the beach and stooped
for more.
Jack spoke
again, impatiently.
“Has everybody
eaten as much as they want?”
His tone
conveyed a warning, given out of the pride of ownership, and the boys ate faster
while there was still time. Seeing there was no immediate likelihood of a pause.
Jack rose from the log that was his throne and sauntered to the edge of the
grass. He looked down from behind his paint at Ralph and Piggy. They moved a
little farther off over the sand and Ralph watched the fire as he ate. He
noticed, without understanding, how the flames were visible now against the dull
light. Evening was come, not with calm beauty but with the threat of violence.
Jack spoke.
“Give me a
drink.”
Henry brought
him a shell and he drank, watching Piggy and Ralph over the jagged rim.. Power
lay in the brown swell of his forearms: authority sat on his shoulder and
chattered in his ear like an ape.
“All sit
down.”
The boys
ranged themselves in rows on the grass before him but Ralph and Piggy stayed a
foot lower, standing on the soft sand. Jack ignored them for the moment, turned
his mask down to the seated boys and pointed at them with the spear.
“Who is going
to join my tribe?”
Ralph made a
sudden movement that became a stumble. Some of the boys turned toward him.
“I gave you
food,” said Jack, “and my hunters will protect you from the beast. Who will join
my tribe?”
“I’m chief,”
said Ralph, “because you chose me. And we were going to keep the fire going. Now
you run after food-”
“You ran
yourself !” shouted Jack. “Look at that bone in your hands!”
Ralph went
crimson.
“I said you
were hunters. That was your job.”
Jack ignored
him again.
“Who’ll join
my tribe and have fun?”
I’m chief,”
said Ralph tremulously. “And what about the fire? And I’ve got the conch-”
“You haven’t
got it with you,” said Jack, sneering. “You left it behind. See, clever? And the
conch doesn’t count at this end of the island-”
All at once
the thunder struck. Instead of the dull boom there was a point of impact in the
explosion.
“The conch
counts here too,” said Ralph, “and all over the island.”
“What are you
going to do about it then?”
Ralph examined
the ranks of boys. There was no help in them and he looked away, confused and
sweating. Piggy whispered.
“The
fire-rescue.”
“Who’ll join
my tribe?”
“I will.”
“Me.”
“I will.”
“I’ll blow the
conch,” said Ralph breathlessly, “and call an assembly.”
“We shan’t
hear it.”
“Come away.
There’s going to be trouble. And we’ve had our meat.”
There was a
blink of bright light beyond the forest and the thunder exploded again so that a
littlun started to whine. Big drops of rain fell among them making individual
sounds when they struck.
“Going to be a
storm,” said Ralph, “and you’ll have rain like when we dropped here. Who’s
clever now? Where are your shelters? What are you going to do about that?”
The hunters
were looking uneasily at the sky, flinching from the stroke of the drops. A wave
of restlessness set the boys swaying and moving aimlessly. The flickering light
became brighter and the blows of the thunder were only just bearable. The
littluns began to run about, screaming.
Jack leapt on
to the sand.
“Do our dance!
Come on! Dance!”
He ran
stumbling through the thick sand to the open space of rock beyond the fire.
Between the flashes of lightning the air was dark and terrible; and the boys
followed him, clamorously. Roger became the pig, grunting and charging at Jack,
who side-stepped. The hunters took their spears, the cooks took spits, and the
rest clubs of firewood, A circling movement developed and a chant While Roger
mimed the terror of the pig, the littluns ran and jumped OB the outside of the
circle. Piggy and Ralph, under the threat of the sky, found themselves eager to
take a place in this demented but partly secure society. They were glad to touch
the brown backs of the fence that hemmed in the terror and made it governable.
“Kill the
beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
The movement
became regular while the chant lost its first superficial excitement and began
to beat like a steady pulse. Roger ceased to be a pig and became a hunter, so
that the center of the ring yawned emptily. Some of the littluns started a ring
on their own; and the complementary circles went round and round as though
repetition would achieve safety of itself. There was tie throb and stamp of a
single organism.
The dark sky
was shattered by a blue-white scar. An instant later the noise was on them like
the blow of a gigantic whip. The chant rose a tone in agony.
“Kill the
beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!
Now out of the
terror rose another desire, thick, urgent, blind.
“Kill the
beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
Again the
blue-white scar Jagged above them and the sulphurous explosion beat down. The
littluns screamed and blundered about, fleeing from the edge of the forest, and
one of them broke the ring of biguns in his terror.
“Him! Him!”
The circle
became a horseshoe. A thing was crawling out of the forest. It came darkly,
uncertainly. The shrill screaming that rose before the beast was like a pain.
The beast stumbled into the horseshoe.
“Kill the
beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
The blue-white
scar was constant, the noise unendurable. Simon was crying out something about a
dead man on a hill.
“Kill the
beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood! Do him in!”
The sticks
fell and the mouth of the new circle crunched and screamed. The beast was on its
knees in the center, it’s arms folded over its face. It was crying out against
the abominable noise something about a body on the hill. The beast struggled
forward, broke the ring and fell over the steep edge of the rock to the sand by
the water. At once the crowd surged after it, poured down the rock, leapt on to
the beast, screamed, struck, bit, tore. There were no words, and no movements
but the tearing of teeth and claws.
Then the
clouds opened and let down the rain like a waterfall. The water bounded from the
mountain-top, tore leaves and branches from the trees, poured like a cold shower
over the straggling heap on the sand. Presently the heap broke up and figures
staggered away. Only the beast lay still, a few yards from the sea. Even in the
rain they could see how small a beast it was; and already its blood was
stain-log the sand.
Now a great
wind blew the rain sideways, cascading the water from the forest trees. On the
mountain-top the parachute filled and moved; the figure slid, rose to its feet,
spun, swayed down through a vastness of wet air and trod with ungainly feet the
tops of the high trees; falling, still falling, it sank toward the beach and the
boys rushed screaming into the darkness. The parachute took the figure forward,
furrowing the lagoon, and bumped it over the reef and out to sea.
Toward
midnight the rain ceased and the clouds drifted away, so that the sky was
scattered once more with the incredible lamps of stars. Then the breeze died too
and there was no noise save the drip and trickle of water that ran out of clefts
and spilled down, leaf by leaf, to the brown earth of the island. The air was
cool, moist, and clear; and presently even the sound of the water was still. The
beast lay huddled on the pale beach and the stains spread, inch by inch.
The edge of
the lagoon became a streak of phosphorescence which advanced minutely, as the
great wave of the tide flowed. The clear water mirrored the clear sky and the
angular bright constellations. The line of phosphorescence bulged about the sand
grains and little pebbles; it held them each in a dimple of tension, then
suddenly accepted them with an inaudible syllable and moved on.
Along the
shoreward edge of the shallows the advancing clearness was full of strange,
moonbeam-bodied creatures with fiery eyes. Here and there a larger pebble clung
to its own air and was covered with a coat of pearls. The tide swelled in over”
the rain-pitted sand and smoothed everything with a layer of silver. Now it
touched the first of the stains that seeped from the broken body and the
creatures made a moving patch of light as they gathered at the edge. The water
rose farther and dressed Simon’s coarse hair with brightness. The line of his
cheek silvered and the turn of his shoulder became sculptured marble. The
strange attendant creatures, with their fiery eyes and trailing vapors, busied
themselves round his head. The body lifted a fraction of an inch from the sand
and a bubble of air escaped from the mouth with a wet plop. Then it turned
gently in the water.
Somewhere over
the darkened curve of the world the sun and moon were pulling, and the film of
water on the earth planet was held, bulging slightly on one side while the solid
core turned. The great wave of the tide moved farther along the island and the
water lifted. Softly, surrounded by a fringe of inquisitive bright creatures,
itself a silver shape beneath the steadfast constellations, Simon’s dead body
moved out toward the open sea.
The Shell and the Glasses
Piggy eyed the
advancing figure carefully. Nowadays he sometimes found that he saw more clearly
if he removed his glasses and shifted the one lens to the other eye; but even
through the good eye, after what had happened, Ralph remained unmistakably
Ralph. He came now out of the coconut trees, limping, dirty, with dead leaves
hanging from his shock of yellow hair. One eye was a slit in his puffy cheek and
a great scab had formed on his right knee. He paused for a moment and peered at
the figure on the platform.
“Piggy? Are
you the only one left?”
“There’s some
littluns.”
“They don’t
count. No biguns?”
“Oh-Samneric.
They’re collecting wood.”
“Nobody else?”
“Not that I
know of.”
Ralph climbed
on to the platform carefully. The coarse grass was still worn away where the
assembly used to sit; the fragile white conch still gleamed by the polished seat
Ralph sat down in the grass facing the chiefs seat and the conch. Piggy knelt at
his left, and for a long minute there was silence.
At last Ralph
cleared his throat and whispered something.
Piggy
whispered back.
“What you
say?”
Ralph spoke
up.
“Simon.”
Piggy said
nothing but nodded, solemnly. They continued to sit, gazing with impaired sight
at the chief’s seat and the glittering lagoon. The green light and the glossy
patches of sunshine played over their befouled bodies.
At length
Ralph got up and went to the conch. He took the shell caressingly with both
hands and knelt, leaning against the trunk.
“Piggy”
“Uh?”
“What we going
to do?”
Piggy nodded
at the conch.
“You could-”
“Call an
assembly?”
Ralph laughed
sharply as he said the word and Piggy frowned.
“You’re still
chief.”
Ralph laughed
again.
“You are. Over
us.”
“I got the
conch.”
“Ralph! Stop
laughing like that. Look, there ain’t no need, Ralph! What’s the others going to
think?”
At last Ralph
stopped. He was shivering.
“Piggy-”
“Uh?”
“That was
Simon.” “You said that before.”
“Piggy-”
“Uh?”
“That was
murder.”
“You stop it!”
said Piggy, shrilly. “What good’re you doing talking like that?”
He jumped to
his feet and stood over Ralph.
“It was dark.
There was that-that bloody dance. There was lightning and thunder and rain. We
was scared!”
“I wasn’t
scared,” said Ralph slowly, “I was-I don’t know what I was.”
“We was
scared!” said Piggy excitedly. “Anything might have happened. It wasn’t-what you
said.”
He was
gesticulating, searching for a formula.
“Oh, Piggy!”
Ralph’s voice,
low and stricken, stopped Piggy’s gestures. He bent down and waited. Ralph,
cradling the conch, rocked himself to and fro.
“Don’t you
understand, Piggy? The things we did-”
“He may still
be-”
“No.”
“P’raps he was
only pretending-”
Piggy’s voice
trailed off at the sight of Ralph’s face.
“You were
outside. Outside the circle. You never really came in. Didn’t you see what
we-what they did?”
There was
loathing, and at the same time a kind of feverish excitement, in his voice.
“Didn’t you
see, Piggy?”
“Not all that
well. I only got one eye now. You ought to know that, Ralph.”
Ralph
continued to rock to and fro.
“It was an
accident,” said Piggy suddenly, “that’s what it was. An accident.” His voice
shrilled again. “Coming in the dark-he hadn’t no business crawling like that out
of the dark. He was batty. He asked for it. He gesticulated widely again. “It
was an accident.”
“You didn’t
see what they did-”
“Look, Ralph.
We got to forget this. We can’t do no good thinking about it, see?”
“I’m
frightened. Of us. I want to go home. Oh God, I want to go home.”
“It was an
accident,” said Piggy stubbornly, “and that’s that.”
He touched
Ralph’s bare shoulder and Ralph shuddered at the human contact.
“And look,
Ralph”-Piggy glanced round quickly, then leaned close-”don’t let on we was in
that dance. Not to Samneric.”
“But we were!
All of us!”
Piggy shook
his head.
“Not us till
last. They never noticed in the dark. Anyway you said I was only on the
outside.”
“So was I,”
muttered Ralph, “I was on the outside too.”
Piggy nodded
eagerly.
“That’s right.
We was on the outside. We never done nothing, we never seen nothing.”
Piggy paused,
then went on.
“We’ll live on
our own, the four of us-”
“Four of us.
We aren’t enough to keep the fire burning.”
“We’ll try.
See? I lit it.”
Samneric came
dragging a great log out of the forest. They dumped it by the fire and turned to
the pool. Ralph jumped to his feet.
“Hi! You two!”
The twins
checked a moment, then walked on.
“They’re going
to bathe, Ralph.”
“Better get it
over.”
The twins were
very surprised to see Ralph. They flushed and looked past him into the air.
“Hullo. Fancy
meeting you, Ralph.”
“We just been
in the forest--”
“-to get wood
for the fire-”
“-we got lost
last night.”
Ralph examined
his toes.
“You got lost
after the . . .”
Piggy cleaned
his lens.
“After the
feast,” said Sam in a stifled voice. Eric nodded. “Yes, after the feast.”
“We left
early,” said Piggy quickly, “because we were tired.”
“So did we-”
“-very early-”
“-we were very
tired.”
Sam touched a
scratch on his forehead and then hurriedly took his hand away. Eric fingered his
split lip.
“Yes. We were
very tired,” repeated Sam, “so we left early. Was it a good-”
The air was
heavy with unspoken knowledge. Sam twisted and the obscene word shot out of him.
“-dance?”
Memory of the
dance that none of them had attended shook all tour boys convulsively.
“We left
early.”
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